Lighthouse Horror Podcast - I Work at a Parking Garage. There are 5 STRANGE RULES

Episode Date: October 7, 2026

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My name is Perry, and I've worked at Hal's parking garage for four years. I work nights from 8 in the evening until 6 in the morning. Most of the job is exactly what you'd expect. I hand out parking tickets, watch the cameras, and collect the tickets when people leave. When somebody forgets where they parked, I help them find their car. The garage stands between an office building and a row of restaurants. It has 12 public parking floors, a closed 13th floor, and a base. A ramp connects the public floors.

The elevator serves the whole building while the stairs stop at 12. My booth sits on the ground floor between the entrance and exit lanes with windows on all four sides. During the day, people pay to park. After six in the evening, parking is free. Hal still makes everyone take a ticket on the way in and return it on the way out. The entrance machine prints them and the exit gate stays down until I collect them. Customers can come and go on foot while their cars are parked. When they finish using the garage, they return the ticket, even if they leave their car behind and take a taxi.

Hal owns the place and handles most of the repairs himself. He lives close by and often stays for part of my shift, especially on Saturdays. He's a heavy man in his 60s who wears plain work shirts and brings his coffee in a large steel flask. If you met him outside the garage, you'd probably take him for a retired. mechanic. He keeps five rules posted beside the ticket machines and inside the elevator. There's another copy on the counter in my booth. The rules don't mention the speed limit or where to leave a shopping cart. Hal showed me those things separately when he hired me. He made sure I understood the five rules before he let me work alone.

Last Saturday, I arrived at eight and found him replacing a bulb above the exit. The restaurants were busy and a concert in a nearer. by theater had filled most of the lower floors. Cars moved slowly up the ramp, while people walked toward the pedestrian door. I put my lunch in the booth's small refrigerator and check the cameras. Ah, the gate's working. Pal told me when he came down from his ladder. Keep an eye on people following each other out. They get impatient when the concert finishes. Yeah, I'll make him stop. I began. You fill the water bowls? I left that for you.

Hal began. Clyde's been sitting beside them since dinner. He seems to think an empty bowl is a personal insult. Clyde was an orange stray, with a bent ear and white feet. He slept near the booth where the concrete stayed dry. There were other cats in the building, but Klein was the only one I'd named. I bought him food and left fresh water where passing tires couldn't reach it. He usually followed me while I filled his bowls.

That evening, I set the water down and watched him drink. Hal put his ladder away, then brought a chair into the booth. I opened the window facing the exit lane and laid a stack of collected tickets in the drawer. Outside, people stood beneath the restaurant awnings, waiting for tables. For the next hour, I watched cars and listened to Hal work through his coffee. Rule 1. Always turn in your ticket. The first problem began, with a man in a blue sedan. He'd parked earlier that evening, and I saw him coming down the ramp just after nine. He had his phone against his ear,

and his ticket resting between two fingers on the steering wheel. There was a white van ahead of him. Its driver handed me a ticket, waited for the arm to rise, and pulled away. The sedan moved right behind it. I leaned out of the window and held up my hand, but the man was looking toward the street. He passed the booth without stopping. I pressed the gate button, although I knew the safety sensor wouldn't let the arm come down on his roof. His back tires crossed the white line at the garage exit before the arm lowered. I watched him turn right out of the street.

He drove past the first restaurant and disappeared beyond the edge of my window. The street camera showed him going. through the traffic light with the rest of the cars. I could still see people on the sidewalk. Nothing happened to them when he passed. Hal had been cleaning the lid of his flask at the sink. I told him what had happened and pointed to the empty exit lane. He dried his hands, came to the window, and checked the street camera. Then he stayed beside me instead of returning to his chair. We both watched the corner where the sedan had gone. He kept his ticket. And I saw it in his hand, I said.

Well, then he has a chance. Help again. If he comes back, get him inside the line before he take it. Make sure he gives you the original. The next car stopped where it should. I took its ticket, raised the gate, and watched it leave. A couple came downstairs looking for a gray SUV, so I checked the cameras and told them which floor to use.

Howe continued watching the street. He didn't mention the sedan again while we dealt with our other customers. Fifteen minutes after leaving, the man returned. He came from the same corner, crossed the empty lane beside the curb, and stopped outside the exit gate, facing into the garage. His headlights shone straight through my window. He had both hands on the steering wheel, and his mouth was wide open. At first I thought he was trying to speak through the closed glass.

I raised the arm to let him come back in. He drove far enough for the whole car to cross the white line, then stopped beside the booth. Hal stepped outside and pointed him into a space beside the wall so he wouldn't block departing cars. The driver followed the gesture. When he got out, he kept looking toward the street. His shirt was wet across the chest. One sleeve had a dark handprint on it, with finger marks,

running from his elbow to his shoulder. He had a small cut beside his mouth. He walked toward us without closing his car door and held the ticket so tightly that the paper had folded into a narrow strip. I asked him to put it on the counter. He tried, but his fingers wouldn't open. Hal gave him a paper cup of water and waited

while he worked his thumb beneath a folded edge. The man finally loosened his grip. I took the ticket. check the printed time, and put it in the drawer. He watched my hand until the drawer was shut. He told us what had happened without either of us needing to ask much. He turned out of the street, driven through the light, and continued toward his home. At the next intersection, he noticed there were no other moving cars. Vehicles stood along the curb, but their windows were totally dark. The restaurant signs were still lit. The people on the sidewalks were standing still. One man waited

at a crosswalk with his arm extended over the button. A woman stood beside an open car door. Farther along, three people faced the window of a closed shop. The driver stopped beside them and asked if a road had been blocked. None of them looked at him. He moved closer to the curb and lowered his window. The woman beside the corridor turned her head. He could see the side of her face, but where her eyes should have been. The skin had sunk into a dark hole. He raised his window before she reached it. When he looked ahead, the man at the crossing was walking toward his hood. He put the car in reverse and backed away. The three people outside the shop turned together and followed. He could see them through his windshield as he turned the car.

car around, and all three kept their faces pointed right toward him. He drove back along the same street he just used. The houses and shops were where he expected them to be. He passed the restaurant on the corner and recognized the garage sign ahead. The trouble was the people. There were more of them along his return route, standing in doorways or between parked cars. Several stepped off the curb when they saw him coming. He slowed beside the garage because a man, was standing in the lane. He lowered his window to tell the man to move. The man reached through the opening and caught his sleeve. The driver pulled away, tearing the fabric of the shoulder. When he looked back, the man was still standing in the road. His arm hung at his side

with a strip of shirt clenched in his hand. And that was when the driver saw Argate. He said the light above the booth was the only light he could see people moving beneath. He could see me inside and howled beside the window. He drove straight toward us and stopped at the arm. He hadn't known whether we would let him back in. While he spoke, I watched the sidewalk outside. A group of concert goers passed the entrance carrying programs. A delivery cyclist stopped at the traffic light. The driver looked at them too, and his breathing slowed. He pointed to the restaurant across the street and told us he'd passed it twice without seeing anyone inside. He kept his eyes on the ticket drawer and asked whether he could leave now. He'd given it back and wanted me to check that he

had nothing else to return. I looked at the floor around his feet and told him the ticket was all we needed. You can leave. I began. Stop at the gate and let me raise it. Take your time getting into the street. He looked at me with relief and said, Thank you. And I'm sorry. I just nodded back. He was very lucky. He returned to his car and closed the door carefully. I checked that the lane was clear, then raised the arm. He pulled forward, crossed the line, and stopped at the curb to let a bus pass. He looked into the bus windows before turning right.

This time, I watched him continue among the ordinary traffic until he was gone. Hal calls the place outside. Limbo. People who left with their tickets could see streets and buildings, but they couldn't reach the people who belong there. Coming back to the garage and returning the ticket could put them on the proper street again. If they didn't return the ticket. or worse if they lost it, they would stay out there forever.

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Free of charge. That MGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. Rule 2. Never press floor 13 in the elevator. Shortly after 10, a man in a light jacket came through the pedestrian entrance and stopped in my booth. He had his parking ticket in one hand and his keys in the other. He'd been at the concert, and now he couldn't remember which floor he'd left his car on. He told me it was a gray sedan. He remembered driving high into the building, because the lower floors were full,

but he hadn't looked at the number beside his space. All right, wait here while I check the cameras, I told him. I could find it for you. No reason to walk around every floor. I started looking through the upper floor cameras. While I checked the first row of spaces, he left the window. I looked up and saw him heading toward the elevator. He seemed to think he could find the car faster himself.

The elevator was for people going between the parking floors. customers left their cars and their spaces and used it to get back to street level. The buttons went from the ground floor to 12. Beneath 12 was a flat middle plate where the 13th floor button used to be. Hal had removed that button. I'd watched him do it. He'd taken it out of the panel and covered the hole, and for a while the plate stayed where he'd put it.

Sometimes, though, the button comes back. We could check the panel at the beginning of a shift and find nothing but the plate. Later, a customer would step inside, and thirteen would be there again. That was why Hal kept the warning posted above the buttons even after removing it. I switched to the elevator camera. The man stepped inside and stood facing the panel. I could see his hand moved toward the numbers. A button lit up beneath twelve.

13 was back. He looked at it for a moment. Then he pressed it. I reached for the intercom, but the doors were already closing. And the elevator began going up. I told him to leave the buttons alone and stay inside when it stopped. He looked toward the speaker, confused, then check the numbers above the doors. Hal came beside me.

When he saw the floor indicator, he opened the control. box beneath a monitor. He kept a key for it on his belt. There was a switch inside that let him bring the elevator back to the ground floor. Before he could turn it, the number reached thirteen. The doors opened onto complete darkness. The light from inside the elevator fell across a narrow strip of concrete. Beyond that, I couldn't see a wall, a pillar, or any parked vehicles. The man leaned toward the opening, trying to make out what was out there. Two red eyes appeared directly ahead of him. He stepped back. More eyes opened farther into the dark. Some were close to the floor. Others were far above the doorway.

Stay inside, I told him. Move to the back of the elevator. We're bringing you down. Hal turned the switch. The doors began to close, but something passed across the opening before they met. They stopped and slid apart again. The man pressed himself against the wall beside the buttons. His hand hovered over the panel, as if he wanted to choose another floor. I told him to move away from it, and this time he listened.

Something ran through the darkness outside. I heard quick footsteps through the intercom. and saw a shape cross the strip of light. Another followed it in the opposite direction. Neither stayed in view long enough for me to see it clearly. The red eyes kept moving. Several pairs gathered near the doorway, while others passed behind them. The man watched one pair come closer,

then looked upward as a hand gripped the top of the opening. A second hand reached around the doorframe and caught his jacket at the shoulder. He turned away and the fabric tore. The hand slipped off him as he dropped to his knees. Three scratches opened across the upper part of his back. He crawled into the rear corner and covered his head. Hal kept the switch turned. The doors tried to close again. One of the hands caught the edge of a panel and held it. I could hear the motor working through the speaker, but the opening stayed wide enough for us to see the eyes outside.

There were demons on that floor. Hal had warned me about them when he explained the rule. I'd seen them on the monitor before, but I'd never seen anyone so close to him. The man stayed curled in the corner. Blood showed through the torn back of his shirt. He'd stopped looking at the doorway. Hal released the switch and turned it again. The hand let go of the door.

Both panels slid shut. The number above our monitor changed from 13 to 12, then kept going down. Hal held the switch until the elevator reached the ground floor. Take the first aid box, he told me. Stand back when the door is open. Let him come out to you. I went to the lobby. The doors opened, and the man lifted his head. He looked past me at the bench, the stairs, and the light above the entrance.

I told him he was back on the ground floor. He crawled out before trying to stand. I put the first aid box on the bench and helped him sit. Hal lock the elevator controls at ground level, leaving its doors open, then came over to look at the man's back. His jacket and shirt were torn near the shoulder. The scratches beneath him were bleeding. The man told us he'd meant to start on the highest floor

and look for his car on the way down. He'd seen 13 light up and pressed it without reading the warning. He kept looking toward the elevator while he explained. Hal stayed with him. I went back to the booth to watch the gate and finished checking the cameras. I found his gray sedan on 12 near the stairwell. I wrote down the floor and space number and put the note on the counter. Hal went back to the open elevator.

A strip of jacket hung from the door frame. He pulled it free with it. pliers, then check the empty space inside with his flashlight. The metal plate was back beneath 12. There was no button for the 13th floor. Hal shut the doors and left the controls locked. He taped a closed sign across them. I think we'll use the stairs tonight. If anyone complains, you send them to me. I put the first aid box beneath a counter and washed the blood for my hands. On the monitor, the elevator stood empty and ground level. Hal carried his tools back to the booth, and I returned to the exit window. Rule 3. Never park in the basement. I looked through

the window and saw a pickup stopped beside the ticket machine. Its driver had taken his ticket, but hadn't gone up the ramp. He was pointing toward the separate ramp leading down to the basement. Two orange cones and a large closed sign stood at the top. I stepped out of the booth and told them the basement wasn't open. He looked up the main ramp where several cars were waiting to turn out of the next floor. He asked whether all the spaces downstairs had been taken. I told them there were spaces above and that he needed to use those. Then another car arrived at the exit and I returned to collect its ticket.

The pickup went through the cones. I saw its brake lights sink below the edge of the floor and heard the tires rolled down the slope. I called after the driver, but he kept going. By the time I reached the top of the basement ramp, his truck had turned around the concrete wall at the bottom. The cold coming up from the ramp struck my face. Outside, the evening was warm enough that people were walking around in short sleeves.

But the basement air hurt my face. I stayed on the concrete at the top and watched a thin white mist drift around the turn below. Howell came out carrying his flashlight. I told him the driver had gone down to spike the sign. He checked the time, then looked toward the basement without stepping onto the slope. We went back to the booth and brought the basement camera onto the largest monitor. The camera faced the row of spaces nearest the ramp. The pickup had parked beside a support pillar. Its engine was still running, and the exhaust hung behind it in a thick white cloud.

The driver sat inside, looking at his phone. There were empty spaces on either side. Farther back, several cars stood beneath a deep layer of frost, their tires half buried in pale crust. Tell him to drive up now. Keep it short. He needs to move before he shuts that engine off. Hal said. I used the speaker mounted above the basement ramp.

I told the driver his truck wasn't allowed there and that he had to return to the ground floor. He looked toward the camera and then toward the frozen cars. He put his phone down. On the screen, I could see him rubbing his hands together before reaching for the gear lever. The pickups exhaust stopped. Its headlights dimmed. Then went out. The driver turned the key.

several times, and the lights flickered with each attempt. Frost formed along the inside of his windshield. He opened his door and climbed out. His breath showed in front of his face. He shut the door, went around the hood, and looked toward the ramp. The mist had thickened behind his truck. A dark figure stood beside one of the older cars. The driver stopped. The figure was roughly the size of an adult, but Frost covered its head in clothes so heavily that I couldn't make out a face. It moved away from the car and stood between two spaces. A second figure appeared beside the pillar behind it. The pickup driver looked from one to the other. Leave the truck, I told him through the speaker.

Walk up the ramp now and bring your ticket with you. The things moved closer to him. looked less human now. One of them opened its mouth wide. The man panicked then and started toward the ramp, but he wasn't running. His shoulders were too stiff, and he held his hands against his chest as if they hurt. One of the figures moved out from behind the pickup. Its feet scraped over the concrete, leaving two dark tracks through the frost. The driver's own footprints were filling with white powder behind him. Hal left the booth and went to the top of the ramp.

I stayed at the monitor so I could tell him what was moving below. The driver reached the turn at the bottom and disappeared behind the concrete wall. A few seconds later, I heard Hal calling him toward the light. The driver came out of the ground floor with a shirt covered in frost. His hands were red, and two fingertips had turned white. There were beads of ice in his hair. Hal took him by the elbow and brought him to the booth where I wrapped a clean towel around his hands. He sat beside the heater with his teeth knocking together.

He kept trying to explain that he'd only wanted an empty space. I gave him warm water and told him to keep the towel around his fingers. He looked at the basement monitor. His truck was still parked beside the pillar, but its windshield was almost completely. completely white. I leaned closer to the screen. A face pressed against the inside of the windshield. Frost coated its cheeks and brow, and its eyes were closed beneath the crust of ice. The driver turned toward me, then back to the monitor. He had left the truck empty. The face stayed at the glass. One hand rose beside it and rested against the steering wheel.

Ice spread down the inside of the windshield until the clear patch narrowed to a strip. Before it closed, I saw the mouth open. A cloud of pale vapor poured from it and filled the front of the truck. The truck stays down there, Hal sent. The man watched the monitor until his breathing settled. Hal called for a medical crew because the skin on his fingers had begun to blister. While we waited, I looked back at the camera. Two more frost-covered figures had gathered around the pickup, with their heads bent toward

its windows. The one inside remained at the wheel. When help arrived, the driver stood slowly and handed his ticket to Hal. Hal put it in our drawer before opening the exit. The man went out with a blanket around his shoulders. I moved the cones closer together across the base. ramp and turn the close sign toward the entrance. From the top, I could hear something dragging across the concrete below.

I went back to the booth before it reached the turn. Those things. They never come up here. I think the warmth keeps them away. How put the man's warm cup in the sink? I could see water dripping from the towel we'd wrapped around his hands. the monitor, his pickup had become another white shape among the parked cars. Rule 4.

Never give someone a ride. By midnight, most of the concert crowd had left. I could hear the restaurant workers dragging chairs and doors across the street. I was checking the exit lane. When a woman came around the corner of the booth, she stopped beneath the light outside my window. She wore a blue coat and carried a small purse. Her hair had been pulled back loosely, with several strands stuck to her cheeks. She looked tired and cold, although the air outside was still warm.

When she saw a howl through the window, she stepped a little farther from the booth. Then she turned toward Maine and lifted her hand. Could you take me to the bus stop? It's only a little way from here. I can't get there on my own. I kept my hand on the counter. She looked toward the car I'd parked beside the booth when I arrived. Then she looked back at May, waiting for an answer.

I'd seen her around the garage before, always asking someone to help her leave. She never arrived through the entrance lane, and she never had a car to collect. I can't give you a ride, I told her. You need to step away from the lane. Cars are still coming down. I'll sit in the back," she said. I won't touch anything. Hal put his pen down and came to the window.

The woman lowered her hand. For a moment, she looked older than she had when she'd first approached. Her mouth tightened, and the corners of her eyes drew down. She walked toward the pedestrian exit, but her shoes stopped at the white line as if she'd struck a wall. She lifted it, said it. it back on our side and turned toward the stairs. Several people were trapped in our garage. They waited beside parked cars or near the stairs, looking for someone who would take them out. They could speak and carry things, and they looked enough like ordinary customers to approach

without frightening anyone. You know, she's going to wait for someone coming down, I began. I'll go tell them before she gets into a car. Yeah, we're in the driver. Help again. Don't take her anywhere. She'll ask you to carry her across that line if she can't get her ride, but don't do it. I went to the lobby. The woman stood beside the bench we'd used earlier, smoothing the front of her coat.

A man in a brown jacket came through the pedestrian entrance, carrying a feeder program. He stopped when she spoke to him. I was still several steps away, and I could hear her telling him she'd been left behind by the person who'd brought her. I reached them, and I told the man he shouldn't give her a ride. He looked at the warning posted beside the stairs, then he looked at her wet cuffs, and the purse held against her chest. She put one hand on his sleeve and continued explaining where she wanted to go.

He told her he'd take her as far as the corner. The woman watched me, keeping her hand on his sleeve. I warned him again, but he thanked me and let her upstairs. His car was on the second floor. I went back and told Hal. On the second floor camera, we watched the man open the passenger door of a silver car. As he put his program on the dashboard, the woman stopped rubbing her hands and let her purse hang at her side. She got into the car.

The man closed her door, walked around the hood, and climbed behind the wheel. I watched them drive toward the ramp. Hal kept the exit gate lowered. The silver car came down and stopped at my window. The driver held out his ticket. The woman sat beside him with her hands in her lap and her face toward the windshield. I told the man to park beside the wall and let her out. He looked from me to Hal, who stood outside beside a gate.

The woman leaned toward him and began speaking. He kept the ticket extended toward my window. Look, you can leave when she's out of the car, I told him. Pull into that space. Get out on your side and come to the booth. Please don't do this, the woman said, looking at me. He said he'd take me. He already said I could go with him. The driver turned toward her.

She caught his wrist and pulled his arm back inside the car. She pressed his hand against the center console, crumpling the ticket beneath his fingers. The car's engine stopped. Its light stayed on, shining against the lower gate. The woman continued holding the driver, but her face had changed. The skin beneath her eyes had drawn tight against the bones. Her lips pulled back, showing dark gaps between her teeth. The purse in her lap tipped open, and dry, gray dirt spilled under her coat.

The driver tried to open his door with his free hand. The woman pulled his trapped wrist closer to her chest. His shoulder turned, and his head struck the edge of the seat. Hal moved beside the driver's window, keeping the car between himself and the woman. He told the man to stop pulling against her grip and get his door open. Finally, the man was able to open the door and get out. He stood beside the car, shaking his hand. Five dark marks circled his wrist.

He pushed his door shut and stepped away. The woman stayed in the passenger seat, staring through the windshield. Hal led the man toward the booth, where I waited to collect his ticket. You said you would help me, the woman told the driver. I heard you say it. You can't leave me here after saying that. The man kept walking toward the booth. He handed me his ticket, then gave Hal his keys.

Hal laid the keys on the counter and explained that the car would after remain where it was until the passenger left it. And the driver nodded without looking back. I put his ticket in the drawer and opened the pedestrian exit. Hal walked beside him until he crossed the white line. The man continued down the sidewalk toward the restaurants. He kept rubbing his wrist, and he didn't look back when Hal called to make sure he'd reach the street. He raised his uninjured hand to show he'd heard.

When Hal returned, the woman was standing beside the passenger door. She'd stepped out on her own. Her face looked ordinary again. She watched Hal approach, then moved toward the stairs. He waited beside the car until she disappeared into the stairwell. Hal checked the car before moving it into a ground floor space. Gray dirt covered the passenger seat, and five deep holes marked the console. He put the keys in our drawer while I let the waiting cars in.

Hal spoke to me about it later, he said. They were judged before. they came here. It is not our job to let them out. Visit BetMGM casino and check out the newest exclusive. The Price is Right Fortune Pick.

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pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Rule 5. Never pick up the cats. At one, Blaine came through the pedestrian entrance. He worked in the restaurant across the street and been coming to the garage for almost as long as I'd work there. He'd finished closing and was coming to collect his car from the fourth floor. He stopped beside the booth when he saw Clyde sitting near his water bowl. Blaine knew the cat. He sometimes brought him small pieces of chicken wrapped in a napkin. That night, he had a paper bag tucked beneath his arm and his car keys in his hand. He put both on the low wall beside the booth and crouched. Clyde came over, rubbed against his name, and waited for the bag to open. There were three cats near

the booth that evening. Clyde stayed close to the water. A gray cat sat beneath Hal's parked car, and a striped one watched us from behind a pillar. They knew where we left the bowls and usually appeared when they heard me open the food container. I kept their food away from the lanes so they could eat without having to move for passing cars. Clyde was the friendliest. He waited beside the booth while I worked

and would get up when he heard my chair move. If I went toward the sink, he followed. If I went toward the exit gate, he stopped beside his bowl and watched. He had a clean, dry place to sleep behind the booth and Hal checked it before moving anything back there. I could feed him. I could give him water, and I could sit on the low wall while he rested beside my shoes. There was nothing wrong with calling him Clyde or letting him come when he heard his name.

The rule concerned one thing, picking him up. Hal had made sure I understood that before I started bringing food for him. Blaine opened his bag and unfolded a napkin. Clyde looked into it, then brushed his cheek against Blaine's hand. I turned toward the exit window to collect a ticket. The departing driver needed directions to the main road, and I pointed him toward the traffic light. When I looked back, Blaine had put his hands beneath Clyde's chest. He lifted the cat slowly, supporting its hind quarters with his other hand. Clyde stayed quiet and let himself be held. His white feet hung beside Blaine's sleeve and his bent ear rested near the man's shirt. Blaine looked down at him and smiled. Thankfully, he hadn't brought the cat against his chest yet. Something dark moved beneath the

orange fur. It gathered beside Clyde's neck, where Blaine's hand supported him. At first, it looked like a patch of dirt coming loose from the coat, and then its edge rose clear of the fur. A thin black shape extended toward the bare skin above Blaine's shirt. Put him down now, I told Blaine, set him on the concrete. Do not bring him any closer to you. Blaine looked at me, confused. Then lowered his hands. He didn't argue or turn it.

and the cat to get a better look. Clyde's feet touched the ground before the dark shape reached Blaine's skin. It folded back into the orange coat. Klein stood beside the water bowl and looked toward the open napkin on the wall. Blaine remained crouched for a moment. He looked at his hands

and rubbed his fingers together. There was nothing on him. No dark mark had reached his wrist or neck and nothing had caught on his shirt. He stood without trying to lift the cat again. What was that? Blaine asked me. I think I saw something reach up toward my collar.

It came out of his fur. We call them spirits, I told them. It was trying to move onto you. You put him down before it could get hold. Hall had heard me from the sink. He came to the door and looked at Clyde, who was now trying to reach the napkin with his nose. Blaine stepped away from the wall so Hal could see his hands and neck.

Hal checked him beneath the booth light, and then he told him he could sit down. I brought a chair outside, and Blaine sat with his hands resting on his knees. Hal stayed beside the wall while I returned to the window. A car came down the ramp, and I collected its ticket before opening the gate. Clyde waited beneath Blaine's chair until the tires had passed. Then he returned to the food on the wall. Now stray cats can carry fleas and ticks, Hal told Blaine. These cats carry something else, too.

Spirits cling to them. While the cats stay on the ground, those things stay in their fur. They stay inside. But when you pick up. one up. A spirit can leave the fur and jump onto you instead. Does the cat know it's in there? Blaine has. He was just sitting in my hands. He didn't even try to scratch me. Well, I don't know what the cat can feel. Help again. He hasn't done anything wrong. You can keep feeding him if you want to. Just don't pick him up.

Blaine took the chicken from the napkin and asked where to put it. I brought Clyde's bowl over and set it beside the chair. Blaine dropped the small pieces into it, keeping his hand clear of the cat's head. Clyde lowered his nose, smelled the food, and started eating. The gray cat came out from beneath Hal's car to watch. I'd seen the dark shapes in their coats before. Sometimes a patch appeared beside an ear or between the shoulder. It could move through the fur while the cat stayed still.

Under the booth light, I could see its edge travel against the direction of the hair. When I set a bowl down, I kept my hands clear and let the cat come forward on its own. Blaine watched me. He asked whether there was a way to get the spirit off the cat. Al looked down then, deep in thought, and then said, You mean like a cat, We looked at each other And then down at Clyde

I took another bowl from behind the booth And filled it for the gray cat The striped one came closer But waited behind the pillar until I stepped away I returned to my window and watched them eat Blaine stayed in the chair Keeping his hands in his lap When Clyde brushed against his shoe

He let the cat pass Blaine folded the empty napkin and put it in the bag. He collected his keys, thanked us, and went upstairs to get his car. Clyde followed him as far as the stairwell, then stopped. Blaine looked down at him and kept his hands at his sides. He went through the door without reaching for the cat. I carried the chair back into the booth. Howell put the spare bowls near the wall where the cats could finish eating.

We stayed beside the exit until Blaine came down from the fourth floor. He stopped at my window, handed me his ticket, and said, You know, I'm not real good with people. I've always been better with animals. I still think he's a good cat, even if he is, you know, demon possessed or something. Tomorrow I'll bring him a chicken sandwich. I put his ticket in the drawer and raised the gate. Blaine pulled out of the street and turned toward home.

Clyde sat near the booth, cleaning a white foot, and meowed. Well, I still work at Hal's parking garage. Most nights I sit on the booth, help people find their cars, and listen to Hal complain about something that needs fixing. I like the job. After four years, I know what to watch for. I collect every ticket before opening the gate, even when parking is free. I also check the elevator panel. If that 13th floor button comes back, nobody gets to press it while I'm watching.

Looking for a lost car is enough trouble without finding that floor. The basement stays closed. An empty space down there isn't worth whatever might be waiting beside it. And when someone wanders over asking for a ride, I refuse. They've already been judged. They are very dangerous. Feeling sorry for them doesn't make them safe to help. Clyde still sleeps beside the booth.

I leave him food and fresh water, and Blaine brings him chicken when he can. He's a good cat. Whatever's hiding in his fur isn't his fault, but I keep him on the ground just the same. If you ever come park your car here, and you see a stray cat in our parking garage, you can feed it. You can give it water. Just remember what might come with it if you pick it up. And who knows? Maybe one day we'll try a cat exorcism.